WASHINGTON – A prominent Iraqi exile yesterday said the anti-Saddam Hussein opposition is already conducting “operations” inside Iraq to try to undermine the regime even before U.S. and allied troops arrive.

“There’s underground activity, leaflets, even occasional operations – let’s leave it at that. I mean activity to undermine the regime,” said Kanan Makiya, who’s in close contact with the Bush administration and a leading advocate of democracy in Iraq.

“There’s activity in the streets actually every night in Baghdad – even a place that’s as controlled and centralized as Baghdad. There are operations going on there, propaganda being disseminated, there are people being encouraged . . . to discourage their sons, their fathers, their cousins from doing anything during the war.”

Makiya appeared with senior Pentagon adviser Richard Perle, who said it seems that America is “on the verge of an act of liberation” that can replace Saddam’s reign of terror with “a decent and humane” government in Iraq.

Perle rejected suggestions that neoconservative thinkers like himself prodded Bush to go after Saddam, saying the decision is “very much the product of the president’s own thinking” and reflects concerns sparked by the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks.

Makiya, just back from an opposition meeting in northern Iraq, outside Saddam’s control, is an MIT-trained architect who teaches at Brandeis University and is working on plans for transition to a democratic Iraq. He wrote “Republic of Fear,” an indictment of Saddam.

Makiya told a press briefing there’s “virtually zilch morale” among Saddam’s henchmen and “we know officers and senior members of [Saddam’s] Ba’ath Party are already seeking out safe havens and houses and preparing to get away.”